Learning Up The House ... by gimleteye

Hold tight wait 'til the party's over
Hold tight we're in for nasty weather
There has got to be a way
Burning down the house
Here's your ticket pack your bag; time for jumpin' overboard
Transportation is here
Close enough but not too far, maybe you know where you are

From The Talking Heads, "Burning Down The House"

In July, The Miami Herald reported that outgoing Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio had landed "a part time job at Florida International University that pays $69,000 amid layoffs and tuition hikes caused by what the university president called, "the most serious budget crisis in our history."

Over the weekend The Tallahassee Democrat blasted the current Florida House Speaker Sansom for accepting a vice president's post at Northwest Florida State College, a job that pays $110,000 annually.

Of Rubio's sudden transformation into an academic, one alumna told The Herald, "I think it's absolutely disgusting. You know how many good professors are out of jobs."

Of the latter's, The Tallahassee Democrat wrote; "According to a Sunday report in the St. Petersburg Times, last spring the Republican from Destin managed to slip into the state budget $200,000 for a 'leadership institute' at the college.

Just last week, "Mr. Sansom warned fellow lawmakers that, given the economic condition of Florida, there would be no state money for local projects such as, well, leadership institutes."

You can hear the Republicans groaning at the gear box, hoisting up the drawbridge at the moat surrounding the Legislature as you read these words.

Rubio and Sansom are not the first legislators to run for the best sinecure they could tie up to. After all, mentor and former Governor Jeb Bush, after leaving office, found the safest consultant contract anyone could want, Lehman Brothers. But as recent history shows, the best place for Florida's Republican leaders to ride out the storm might just be in a place that can't survive without public funding.